


You Are The Only One

by tbazzsnow (Artescapri)



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell, Simon Snow & Related Fandoms
Genre: A little angst with a happy ending, Clearing things up, Communication, Happy Ending, M/M, Miscommunication, POV Simon Snow, POV Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch, Post-Book 2: Wayward Son, Simon has a lot of feelings, Simon isn’t the only one processing here, Simon works it out, The scene I needed when I finished the book, after the beach talk, airplane scene, coming to a realization, flight back to London, in a good way?, many thoughts, processing feelings, relationship, sometimes I love you isn't just those three words, sometimes just a few words are enough, sometimes you need words, thinking it through, this may hurt a bit, working through it, yes I mean me-I’m the one who needed to process the beach scene also
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:46:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,237
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25538272
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Artescapri/pseuds/tbazzsnow
Summary: Simon and Baz are headed back to London after their week in America. Too many things have been left unsaid. Simon spends his time on the airplane thinking about Baz's words. Baz spends his time on the plane giving Simon space and expecting the worst. Clarity comes at unexpected times and in unexpected places. The resolution of the beach scene from Wayward Son.Written for the Golden Days Zine.
Relationships: Tyrannus Basilton "Baz" Pitch/Simon Snow
Comments: 36
Kudos: 248
Collections: Golden Days: a Simon Snow Series zine





	You Are The Only One

**You Are the Only One**

_There is no one left in the world_

_That I can hold onto_

_There is really no one left at all_

_There is only you_

_And if you leave me now_

_You leave all that we were undone_

_There is really no one left_

_You are the only one_

_And still the hardest part for you_

_To put your trust in me_

_I love you more than I can say_

_Why won't you just believe?_

_(The Cure, Trust)_

  
  
  


**Simon**

The flight to London is full. Penny, Agatha and Shepard are all in different rows but somehow Baz and I are seated next to each other. I know that’s Penny’s doing and I should be irritated at her for meddling, but I’m pathetically grateful instead. 

Grateful to have an excuse to sit so close to him. Maybe for the last time.

I don’t know what we have anymore. I don’t know how to ask Baz. I know what I think I should do, what I should have done weeks ago, months ago, but I just can’t bring myself to say the words. 

Even though I know I should. 

It would be kinder for me to do it. I know he’ll be hurt when I do, but I don’t think he’ll let himself break it off. He’ll hang on because he said he would. 

_(An Englishman’s word is his bond)._

We’re leaving behind the roiling mess of America and heading into the uncertainty of what waits for us at home. A mess left behind and unknown chaos ahead is pretty much par for the course for me. Story of my life. 

Penny’s been cryptic about whatever she knows is waiting for us back at Watford. She dropped her bombshell announcement when she interrupted me and Baz on the beach but she’s been mum on the subject since. Doesn’t bode well in my opinion.

I can’t stop thinking about what she interrupted though. Even with the lingering effects of the vampire battle and the absolute certainty that we are in a shit-ton of trouble–with the Coven in general and Penny’s mum in particular–I can’t seem to give any of that my focus. Not when Baz’s words are still echoing in my head. 

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

I’d come to a decision today. One that made me feel bloody awful but that seemed like a chance to wipe the slate clean. Have a fresh start. Come to terms with what I’ve lost and let Baz and Penny get on with their lives. 

Their magickal lives. 

And I’d go on with my Normal one. 

It felt like shit, really. It felt like giving up. 

The only part of it that made any sense was my plan to break up with Baz. To let him go. 

To let him know it was okay to stay here, to make his life in a place where he didn’t have to hide. Where he would be celebrated for what he is–every facet of him. 

He could be a king in America. I thought the vampires in London were ready to put a crown on his head. But Lamb. . . Lamb was ready to give him even more than that. He’d have the keys to an entire kingdom. 

And a partner who was his match.

Baz said he doesn’t want that. That he wouldn’t actually be happier here. 

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

I don’t know what to think about that. He’s been with me and he hasn’t been happy. These last few months . . . I’ve seen it. I’ve seen him pull away, step back, retreat step by step.

_I’ve pulled back._

I’ve seen the pain in his eyes when he looks at me. How it hurts to be with me. 

_It hurts to have Baz so far from me._

He would be happier away from me. How could he not be? I’m a burden, a responsibility, a liability. Baz wanted what I was. He made a promise to the person I used to be, and he’s too damn honourable to go back on his word. 

It’s funny to think I’d never have used the words _honourable_ and _Baz_ in the same sentence back at Watford. 

It’s what twists me up, in my head. How we used to be. The things we’d say. Cruel words aimed at each other, words meant to hurt. 

All those words.

_(The worst Chosen One who’s ever been chosen.)_

_(You’re an idiot, Snow.)_

_(I’ll give you a Viking’s funeral, Snow, do you even know what that is?)_

_(You’re lucky I’m not making you bleed.)_

I’d throw them right back at him.

_(Villain.)_

_(Blood-sucker.)_

_(Vampire.)_

I always said Baz went for the lowest blow. I don’t think I realized I did too. 

He hit me where I was most vulnerable–my magic, my place in the world of Mages.

And I hit him back with insults about the thing that almost destroyed him. That made him want to destroy himself. 

I can’t think about that. 

Those words from our past have made it hard to accept the tenderness of the words he uses now. To acknowledge them or even convince myself they’re real sometimes, when the echoes of what he used to say still live in my head. 

Soft words, tender words, they’re a new language for us. Not as familiar, not as easy, but somehow still _us._ Words that make my heart soar. 

_(Courageous fuck.)_

_(Glorious muppet.)_

I lived for every time Baz would call me _“love.”_

_(Simon, love, get up.)_

For every time he calls me _Simon_. 

I wish he knew. I wish he knew those are the moments I feel the words ring most true–when he says _Simon_ instead of _Snow_. 

_(I choose you. Simon Snow, I choose you.)_

I’d choose Baz over everything. 

It was worth it, to have us both alive at the end. Worth losing my magic. Worth losing who I was. 

To be able to keep him. 

But I can’t keep him after all, can I? I can’t hold him back, tether him to me. 

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

Why would Baz say that? How can he believe it?

I think back to the months before this god-forsaken trip. I did everything I could to push him away. 

The nights he’d look to me, waiting for a sign that he could stay, and the dimming of the light in his eyes as he’d walk out the door. 

The evenings he’d sit on the edge of the sofa, tempting me with curry, with scones, with ice cream. 

The days he’d walk into the flat and I’d see his nostrils flare at the scent of the cider, at the stench of me (unshowered and ungroomed) lying like a lump on the sofa. 

He wasn’t happy then. How can he say he was?

I pull at my hair, fingers clenching into fists. I don’t understand. I don’t know what it means. 

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

How can he believe it still?

I can see him, surrounded by those magickal beings, being felt up by that fucking goat creature. 

Picking bullets out of his flesh late in the night. 

Foraging for snakes, cats, birds, for whatever the hell he could find to keep himself going. 

Wearing the same damn clothes, day after day. 

The sun burning his nose to ash and Baz not voicing a word of complaint.

Merlin and Morgana, this week has been such hell. 

Fuck it all. He’s been ravaged by this trip. Stripped down to his bare bones. Expending every bit of energy to get us out alive. 

There’s nothing to be happy about. 

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

I sigh and I stretch in this cramped seat. There’s some action film playing on the screen. I can’t follow it. My mind is filled with Baz. That hasn’t changed at all. 

Always Baz. 

I think about Baz teaching me to drive earlier this week. Can that only be a few days ago? It feels like an eternity. 

How he held Penny so tenderly. 

The way he’d watch me when it was my turn at the wheel. 

I see us at the Renaissance Faire, hear the honeyed words falling from his lips, the radiant joy on his face when we sparred. The comforting weight of his hands on me when I kissed him. The way his lips opened at the touch of mine. 

How we kissed under the stars. And Baz held me so gently, so carefully, as if he thought I might fly away, right then, right there. 

Merlin, I love him. Why can’t I let myself believe I can have this?

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

Breaking up with Baz isn’t something I want to do because I don’t love him. It was something I thought I needed to do _because_ I love him. Because he deserves better.

That television show--there was something about ‘ _if you love something, set it free.’_ That’s what I thought I was doing with Baz, if I broke up with him. Setting him free. 

But I’d be hurting him once again. I see that now, I think. Hurting him more–I’ve hurt him for so long, in so many different ways. 

I used to mean to do it. Hurt him. 

He did too. 

But he’s said he loved me that whole time. Even then. Even when our interactions were nothing more than the trading of insults and outright threats of violence. 

I can see now that those harsh barbs were his defense mechanism, to protect himself, shield himself, get by. That’s how Baz manages, how he keeps the softness inside hidden from the world. 

Hidden from everyone but me. 

I don’t want to get by. 

I don’t want to cause him any more pain. 

I love him so damn much. I can think it in my head. I can know it in my heart. 

I’d bleed myself dry for him.

But somehow I can’t ever get the words out. I feel like I’d be caging him with them, each _“I love you”_ another link in a chain binding him to me and dragging him down, when he should be soaring.

I didn’t want to come down, when I was flying with him in my arms. I didn’t want to sink into the place where things were muddled again. 

Up there. . . up there it was just me and Baz and none of the other static that clogs my throat, silences my words, clouds my mind. 

I could keep him close, keep him safe, hold him as tightly as I wanted and never let him go. 

Both of us soaring free.

It doesn’t make sense that he’d want me, broken and useless, remote and empty. 

But he still does, doesn’t he?

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

He wanted me when he thought I hated him. When I did hate him, with some part of me. 

When he thought it was hopeless. Pointless.

He loved me through that, despite that.

He waited for me to figure it out. 

He’s waiting still. I keep making Baz soldier through my shit. And he does. He always does. 

I have so much to figure out. So little I’m sure of anymore. 

Just that I love him. 

It’s the only thing I’m certain of. 

It’s been a weight on me for months, how much I love him. How much my love would burden him if he knew. 

I’ve never loved anyone the way I love Baz. I’ve never let myself open my heart this way. It’s all encompassing. I’d pull him in my arms, curl my wings around him, and shut us away from the world if I could. 

But I think I had it wrong. 

I think not knowing how much I love him has hurt him.

When it was so dark, when the grey fog would take over my brain, when the static in my head drowned everything else out–all that glimmered in the shadows, the only spark of light reflecting back to me was my love for Baz, shattered and broken as it was.

As I was.

Baz said something last year, when he visited me at Penny’s house on one of his weekends away from Watford. Usually he spoke of mundanities, just to fill the empty space between us with words. He probably didn’t think I was even listening, but for the first time, he opened up about his time with the numpties. Really talked about it. The confusion. The pain. The hunger. 

His desperation. How close he came to giving up.

How his thoughts turned to me.

 _Me._

And that’s what kept him going. What kept him alive.

I don’t think I understood the enormity of what he shared at the time.

I don’t think I understood it until now.

Until I came so close to losing him. 

Until I almost lost the spark that’s kept _me_ going.

Baz is my everything, and I think perhaps he needs me as much as I need him. 

And maybe Baz Pitch actually loves me, insane as that may be. All of me, this fucking mess that I am. 

It’s so hard to accept how much Baz cares. It’s hard to feel I deserve it. It’s difficult to believe he loves me as much as I love him. 

Why would he?

I mean, look at him–he’s perfect. Look at me–I’m a disaster. 

He’s always said we match but I’ve never let myself believe it. I couldn’t see it.

Maybe he is right. Maybe we don’t match on the outside. 

But inside, where it matters. Inside where it counts. 

Where the only light in our darkness is the other.

I can say _“I love you”_ in my head. I can say it a thousand ways without using those three words. 

Baz hasn’t said it either. Not in a way that made sense to me. Not in a way that seemed real. But he’s been telling me he loves me all along, hasn’t he? 

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_ is as much a declaration of love as saying _“I love you”,_ isn’t it?

I take a breath in. Push it back out. 

In. Out. 

Baz hasn’t been happy these last few months. _Because I haven’t been_. Because there’s nothing he’s been able to do that’s made a difference. 

But he’s stayed. 

Because if there’s a chance of happiness, someday, someway, he wants to be there for it. At my side. 

There’ve been glimpses this week. Of what it could be. 

If I let myself hope. If I let myself believe the words, translate the touches, understand that the moments we have may carry the weight of our love without either of us saying it out loud. 

If I let myself trust in this. 

_(It’s the sort of thing that’s supposed to go poetically unsaid.)_

We may have carried that idea a bit too far. 

We never learned how to talk to each other. We went from enemies to uneasy allies, from that to terrible boyfriends. There was never a chance to transition from one extreme to the next. We skipped right over the middle part. 

Baz is the one who’s supposed to be good with words but that skill kind of falls apart when it comes to me, I think. 

I’m terrible with them. But I used to be able to solve things with my mouth as far as Baz was concerned--I’d lean into him and he’d shut up and close his eyes. 

He still does. 

That’s not enough anymore. It doesn’t fix things. 

It just muddles them up more, if there aren’t words to go along. To bridge the gap. To say the things that have remained unsaid for far too long.

Baz is hunched in the seat next to me, arms folded across his chest, legs crossed at the knee. Like he’s trying to take up as little space as possible. To give me the room I need. 

_“Why can’t you see that I wouldn’t be happy anywhere without you?”_

I wouldn’t be happy without him. I know that. 

He doesn’t know it though. I haven’t ever told him. 

He used to be mine. 

I’ve been turning his words over and over in my head and no matter how I look at them, no matter how loud the voice in my head is–the one that keeps telling me I don’t deserve him–I can’t help but think somehow, despite everything, he still is. 

Mine. 

Because he wants to be. 

And I want him. _I want him._

I take another deep breath.  
  
In. 

Out.

  
  


**Baz**

We’ve barely said two words to each other since the flight took off. I can’t sleep. I can’t even allow myself the luxury of pretending to sleep. 

My words at the beach (and Simon’s lack of a response to them) hang over us. I don’t want to close my eyes if these are the last glimpses of Simon Snow that I’m allowed. I don’t even take the opportunity to feign sleep so I can rest my head against his shoulder, touch him one last time before he tells me this is over. That he can’t move on with me holding him back. 

For him to tell me he doesn’t want or need me in his life anymore.

I give him space.

I stay awake, the warmth of Simon’s arm occasionally brushing my elbow as he shifts in the seat next to me. I savour the sound of his breathing. I follow the beat of his heart, so wrenchingly dear and familiar. I save each as a memory, as something I can hold close when he’s gone, snapshots in my head of what I once had, if only for a little while.

My chest feels tight. Every breath I take in sears me. I keep blinking because I’ll be damned if I allow myself to cry in the middle of the economy section of this god-forsaken flight. 

I can cry when I get home. I can cry in the dark solitude of Fiona’s empty flat, alone with my memories and the realisation that I fucked up the best thing in my life, and I still don’t know quite how I managed to bollocks it up so definitively. 

I’m the one who’s supposed to be good with words. 

But I never found the right ones for Simon. I got so used to saying the worst things, to cover what was so desperately growing in my heart, that I never figured out how to tell him the truth when I had the chance. 

And when I finally got something out–words that barely scratched the surface of what he means to me–it was already too late.

I’ve got my head tilted back into the headrest, eyes half closed. I can keep feasting on the sight of him without being too obvious this way. 

He’s been restless. Hands dragging through his hair, pulling at the curls, then dropping to his sides, fingers clenching and unclenching on the armrests. 

Action films have been flickering on his screen nonstop but with none of the muttered, under-his-breath criticisms of the fight scenes that usually accompany his solitary film appraisals. I don’t think he’s really watching this time. 

_What are you thinking, Simon Snow? Are you trying to find the words that will irrevocably shatter my heart?_

He turns his head away from the screen, towards the window. I can follow the line of his jaw, see the muscles clench and unclench in his cheek. 

Simon swallows and I watch the play of the motion along his neck, the sight so achingly familiar. His arm goes rigid against my own as he squeezes the armrest and then turns his face resolutely forward again. 

That’s when I see it. My stomach lurches, drops, leaving me almost dizzy as the realisation comes.

I know the way he thrusts his jaw forward, that narrowing of his eyes—the tell-tale signs that Simon Snow has just come to a decision. 

I didn’t think it would be here. I didn’t expect it to be now. I’ll never be adequately prepared for this moment but no matter, it’s here. 

The moment he breaks it all off. 

Simon takes a deep breath and then reaches over to take my hand in his, lacing his warm fingers between my cold, trembling ones.

I stare down at our intertwined fingers, waiting.

His thumb brushes over my knuckles. 

“Is this all right then?” His voice is gentle, barely above a whisper, but he knows I’ll hear it. 

My head whips up, my eyes finding his. 

He meets my gaze straight on, something we’ve not managed in days, weeks, months. I can feel the thump of my heart as it picks up its pace. 

I can feel Simon’s do the same.

He squeezes my hand and I realise I haven’t answered him. “Yes. Yes, of course, more than all right.” The words tumble out of me and I ache to have them back–too eager, too much, the raw need in them sure to make him pull away again.

But he doesn’t. His thumb keeps rubbing at my skin. His eyes stay locked on mine. 

There’s a resolute spark in them I haven’t seen in far too long. I don’t know what it means.

“Good.” Simon squeezes my hand once more and bumps his knee against my own as he settles his head on my shoulder with a sigh.

It takes a moment for his body to relax against me. 

It takes a few moments for his heart to slow down to the steady beat I know so well. 

It doesn’t take nearly half that long for the spark of hope to rekindle in my heart. 

I shift so that I can press a butterfly kiss to his tumbled curls. “Get some rest, love.”

Not so hopeless after all then.

  
  


**Simon**

I feel the brush of his lips on my hair and I close my eyes. 

I’ve missed this. Missed being so close to him. Missed my hands on him, his arms around me, the touch of him sparking a fire under my skin. 

I know I should say something. I know we need to talk this through. But I don’t think I can find the right words, not right now. 

I’m knackered. I’ve not done much but sleep the last two days. Penny says it’s normal to be worn out from the injuries and blood loss. I don’t heal as fast as when I had magic. 

Baz is insistent that Dr. Wellbelove examine me as soon as we get back. I think he actually told Agatha we’re going home with her, so he can make sure I get a clean bill of health, the overprotective sod. 

But he’s still my overprotective sod, isn't he, despite everything. Maybe because of everything. I press my face into his neck, breathe him in. 

He smells like vanilla--the residual of being forced to use Agatha’s shampoo the last two days. I miss his posh scent.

Fuck. I’ve missed _him_. 

He’s been inches away for months, but it may as well have been miles. I want him back at my side. I fit, tucked up against Baz. 

_(Because we match.)_

In some surreal, fucked-up way, we do. 

I love him so much. I wanted to tell him, when I held him in my arms, above the flames. 

In the back of the truck, under the stars. 

At the Renaissance Faire. The Cheesecake Factory. So many times back home.

I’ve wanted to tell him for so long. 

My eyes are closing. I let myself melt into Baz’s side, nuzzling into his neck. 

“I love you, Baz.” 

  
**Baz**

I’ve missed having him this close. I’ve missed him so fucking much. I don’t quite know what to make of this moment but I’m savouring every instant. 

Snow’s breath is warm and heady against my skin. His heartbeat is slow and steady. I think he’s asleep.

Then his lips move and it’s only my heightened senses that let me catch the words he mumbles into my skin.

“I love you, Baz.”

I close my eyes and let the tears fall. I’ve waited so long to hear those words. 

This isn’t how I imagined I’d hear them. This isn’t what my fantasies conjured up, when I was so desperate for him to tell me what I hoped was in his heart. There’s no romantic sunset, no breathless kisses, the warmth of his skin more distant than I’d envisioned. 

I’d just about given up hope of ever hearing Simon say that. 

This is better than any of those daydreams. This is reality. And he may not have said them while looking into my eyes but I know they come from his heart, unguarded and untrammeled. 

I can let myself hope again. I can let myself believe I can have this. 

_Us._

I breathe in his scent--brown butter and cinnamon, sweat and Simon. My lips brush his hair again. “I love you, Simon Snow. For always.”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> it was my honor to be a guest contributor for the Golden Days Zine, alongside so many talented writers and artists. The zine has a marvelous collection of art and fanfic and I am so grateful to have been a part of it. 
> 
> My thanks to [mudblood428](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mudblood428/pseuds/Mudblood428), [fight-surrender](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fight_Surrender/works), [ penpanoply](https://archiveofourown.org/users/penpanoply/pseuds/penpanoply/works%22) and [basicbathsheba](https://archiveofourown.org/users/BasicBathsheba/pseuds/BasicBathsheba) for beta reads and support while I was writing this. Thanks to [giishu](https://archiveofourown.org/users/giishu) for the read and the assurance that this read as a happy ending story. And so much gratitude to the wonderful, patient and supportive [krisrix](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KrisRix/pseuds/KrisRix), who not only spearheaded the zine itself, but made time for beta reading this fic and also helping me with the formatting of the final version. 
> 
> title from the song Trust by the Cure.


End file.
